


Midnight

by nimery



Category: Kuroshitsuji | Black Butler
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Implied Sexual Content, Inspired by Mahou Tsukai no Yome, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-21
Updated: 2016-07-21
Packaged: 2018-07-22 19:32:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,740
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7451356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nimery/pseuds/nimery
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ciel Phantomhive was saved at a price.</p>
<p>On his eighteenth birthday, he would cease to be. Taken by the creature who saved him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Midnight

**Author's Note:**

  * For [CielPhantomhive](https://archiveofourown.org/users/CielPhantomhive/gifts).



> Very very loosely based off Mahou Tsukai. Ciel is not taken in by Sebastian and taught magic in this fic, sorry.

Ciel Phantomhive had lived knowing that he wasn't normal.

He had everything he could ever ask for, being an earl- a trusted member of the Queen's court. He had enough money to buy a man's soul, but one glance at that shadow that loomed just outside the corner of his eye reminded him that he couldn't use that money to buy his own.

That shadow had rescued him, once upon a time ago, but for a price. When Ciel reached his majority, he would have to give in to that shadow.

At first, he had been terrified of the prospect, of the figure that seemed to flicker like a candle in front of him. He had been released from one cage, a cage that had been physical- at times he could still feel the cold iron bars that once held him captive- and had been captured so completely by another. The shadow.

He had no other words to describe it- the creature gave him no name, no description, had only claimed to be his new owner. The shadow's words had been the only thing Ciel could cling to. He had been promised life, safety, security, and in return, he had to pay a small price.

If he wanted to live, he had to offer his life. If he wanted to be safe, he had to offer his skin. If he wanted to remain at all in either way-alive and well- he had to offer his everything to that flickering shadow.

Yet he never saw it after that moment of his body beaten and bruised, lying in wait of slaughter on a bloodied slab. With clear eyes he saw the being, one he couldn't rightly describe. When he tried to remember, to look back at the moment he met eyes with the beast, the memory was far too tinged with age to be clear.

But he remembered that there were red eyes looking back at him. Or, he convinced himself after these years that they were. Was it a memory, or a memory of a memory? He wasn't sure, but he knew that when he started thinking like that, it gave him a bit of a headache.

Yet he couldn't help but wonder about the shadow. It could speak, and he was absolutely sure that he had looked into its eyes. Such old, intelligent eyes they had been. He couldn't even imagine how it must have seen him, so young and naive and gullible. A child that would do anything as long as he was told it was the right thing or for his own survival.

Not as though he wasn't a child who had listened to the creature to save himself after seeing all the others in the room slaughtered. Perhaps he thought he was next, though he couldn't remember. He always thought, when he saw the shadow lingering just beyond his sight, that the protection he had been promised had simply been a lie, that the being would rip through him and leave him in bloody pieces on the floor.

He didn't wish for it, but there was always that thought itching at the back of his head that it was a possibility. He knew nothing of the creature that claimed his soul- only felt its presence at times, knew that it was eternally watching him.

Ciel was afraid of it. He was afraid of the unknown that surrounded it like a corrupt aura. He was afraid because he had seen it kill without regret before his eyes.

There were times when he was sure he felt the creature's touch. He'd feel a hand resting on his arm but look and see nothing. Though in the corner of his eye, he'd see that form- the fluid, flame like form of the shadow. He knew the beast was there. He knew that it watched him. Yet, when he laid in bed at night, he felt alone. Part of him was glad the creature was gone.

Another part of him wanted the comfort of company. The years that had passed with the shadow lingering, hovering around him got him accustomed to its presence.

While he feared it, he longed to see that brief vision of it at the edge of his sight. He didn't understand the thought of life without that constant mysterious presence.

* * *

 

The moon was full and hanging high among the stars.

Ciel felt safe in the darkness, as if that shadow was surrounding him and encasing him. But it was a safety that made him feel almost weak. A weakness stemming from a time long past before he had learned to stand alone.

And he did. Only with the shadow looming over him, not quite hindering him or helping him. It watched, and he knew that it did. What he wasn't sure about, though, was if his actions changed because he knew that. He wondered if every time he made a decision, he thought of the shadow, felt its chilled breath on the back of his neck, sending shivers down his spine.

That happened quite often, he realized. He could feel the shadow's presence, hear it breathe at times, and it made him think that it was almost a tangible thing. That if he reached out to where he could hear it, that his hand would settle on it. That maybe he could feel its heartbeat, feel the rise and fall of its chest as it took in those long, frozen breaths.

He could hear it now, that almost painfully close intake of breath, as if the shadow stood directly behind him, looking out at the sky with him.

Clang. Clang. Clang. Clang.

Blue eyes flickered up to where the full moon hung in the sky. The clock down the hall chimed. Ciel knew exactly why he could feel the shadow so tangibly now.

Clang. Clang. Clang. Clang.

He had been waiting for this hour, this minute, for what felt like years now. Years. Ever since he last heard the shadow's voice whisper a single promise in his head.

He'd leave nothing behind. Nothing he held important to himself. The company would, for the time, be transferred to Tanaka, the only other dweller in the house. Ciel had told him all about the shadow, and the old man had readily believed him, not at all thinking that it was the overwhelmed imagination of a scared child.

Clang. Clang. Clang. Clang.

Midnight, precisely, on December fourteenth.

Ciel drew a long breath, the air had grown cold, either from the winter outside or from the being behind him. He could feel it expand, as if to fill the room behind him. To devour him. To consume him whole. To destroy him.

He had expected just this; for years, he had waited for this moment. He had, at that moment, reached his majority, and he was ready to give his all to the shadow. He was ready to die.

It seemed a grim thought at first, to be so young, to know when his passing would come, but as time passed, he discovered the positive side to this. That he would be able to put his affairs in order before he died, that he would be able to ensure that he had no regrets when the time came.

In the week prior to his birthday, he did prepare, with Tanaka's help.

Alone in his bed chamber, though never quite alone, he waited. He waited for that clock to chime. He waited to feel the shadow's claws tear through his skin, just as he'd seen them do all those years ago to those men.

For a moment, Ciel wanted to laugh. Because what if he had simply imagined everything. What if he had simply been a scared child who hallucinated a beast made of flickering shadows that saved him, and promised to consume his everything.

Two voices within his head debated this. One deciding that those thoughts were ludicrous, and that he should put faith in his eyes. The other deciding that he had gone mad, the moment his parents had died he'd gone mad, and he was currently in a straight jacket in a sanitarium somewhere creating a life for himself in his mind.

_That poor Phantomhive boy_ , the nurses would lament, _he just hasn't been the same since the fire_.

But he remembered, all of the times the shadow felt too real to be a lie, a fake, some sordid trick of his mind. He remembered all of the times he would feel something akin to fingertips rest gently on his back, or feel his bed shift at night while he was getting to sleep, as if someone had sat on the edge of his bed, and felt fingers, ice cold fingers, sift through his hair.

He never opened his eyes because he simply didn't know if it was a tangible person, like the nights right after his recovery, when Tanaka would soothe him to sleep, or if it was the shadow, studying him, examining him for any sign that the being had done something wrong by choosing to rescue him.

Ciel couldn't help but wonder, in that moment with the moon shining down on him, spreading his shadow across the room, if the being had a mind. If it mused these things like he did. After all these years, did it regret saving him? Did it think he was no longer worth it? Though he could still feel it, still hear it sometimes, he wondered if that was a trick of his mind, that the creature had left years ago, and that he was now waiting for nothing.

He could swear he still heard it though. He could swear he felt its hands, its breath. He knew it had to be there.

And he wondered, perhaps just by reflex, that if he reached out, to where he heard it, would his hands graze living flesh? He wanted to, so badly. To turn around and reach out. To turn around and simply look. Would he see any shifting in the darkness? Would he see those blood red eyes? Would he see skin and bones and the human form he sometimes envisioned the being having?

Ciel turned his attention from the moon and found himself looking at his moonlit reflection in the glass. If that creature did have form, would he be able to see it in this window, like he could see himself?

Thoughtlessly, his fingertips fell on the pane; the unforgiving cold radiated through his fingers and hand, but he did not dare move again. The cold felt almost like an old friend to him. He wished, for a brief moment, that he could see that being behind him, so he could once more bear witness to the face that evaded his memories. He wanted all of the questions he ever had about it answered. He wanted them, even if he would die soon anyway.

He wanted to see the face of the creature who had saved him and would kill him.

He wanted to know what kind of creature it was; what kind of creature had killed those men bare-handedly. Ciel almost cursed himself, suddenly overcome by the fact that after all those years, all those questions, he had never once attempted- even with all of his resources- to look into the creature that haunted both his waking and dreaming mind.

And dream of it he did.

So many times he had witnessed the creature invade his consciousness, but to his surprise, the dreams were pleasant, always. And though the being didn't appear as it did in his memory in his dream, he always instinctively knew that it was the creature.

It looked less like a flickering shadow, and more like a man, and always with the same bright bloody eyes.

But in his dreams, he seemed happy, standing beside the creature- the man, with his black hair that hung into his face, his broad shoulders. Every dream, the man looked the same, and every dream, Ciel had to look up to see his face.

He wondered if this was a strange case of lucid dreaming, as though he called an invented vision of the creature into his mind.

Though, those dreams did seem to happen, he realized as he thought about it, on the nights when he felt his bed shift, on the nights he was barely awake, but held himself back from moving, out of fear, perhaps, of scaring his visitor away. But he liked those nights, those dreams. They chased away the fear he held deep inside himself; they made the creature less unknown to him.

Those dreams made it almost human.

The man in those dreams would speak to him, and he would answer. They spoke about the past, about what life was like before the fire. He told that man everything, and in return, the man told him what he could. The man would talk about his own past, had told Ciel that he was a few centuries old. That he wasn't a man at all. But Ciel wasn't going to start calling him a creature, a being, like the shadow. Because he could see the man, he could talk to this man, and if he dared it, he could reach out and touch him.

The only downside to these nights was that the dreams always left him more tired than he was ought to be on nights he didn't have the dream. Ciel could only guess that he was lucid dreaming, creating a world inside his mind that was better than the one that laid without.

He began to wonder if tonight would've been one where he had another one of those dreams. He wondered if he would have seen that man again if he had fallen asleep, instead of forcing himself to stay awake, to face his fate head on.

The young man sighed and took a step back from the window, his fingers falling slowly off the glass. Perhaps, he found himself musing, he should fall asleep and meet his fate in the company of one he would call a friend.

But he felt warmth at his back, instead of the cold empty nothingness of darkness. He felt form, shape, the rise and fall of a chest and the faintly steady thumping of a chest. For a moment, he thought it was Tanaka, but the old man wouldn't ever wander into his room after midnight and stand so closely behind him. He would have heard the door open, anyway. Ciel didn't move. He didn't dare to. Part of him knew what was behind him- or who, he supposed- and another part rejected that possibility. The same that had convinced itself that he'd gone mad years ago. That part of his mind screamed, shouted, almost as though in a panicked state, that he was hallucinating. That it was simply the wall of his cell at his back. And while Ciel still refused to move, he refused to believe that part of his mind. He wanted to believe, he wanted to be convinced that it was the man from his dream behind him. Though, that was surely impossible. That man was nothing more than a product of his imagination.

He wanted to believe that the shadow had taken shape, just like it had on the day it rescued him, in order to take his life. Though maybe that was simply the romanticist within him, who wished for such a thing, demanded that his blood be spilled while he looked into those twin carmine eyes, to be scrutinized once more, to have his fate weighed in the hands of such a creature.

Unwittingly, another laugh escaped his lips. He must have been reading too much Lord Byron recently; even he was disgusted by his own thoughts.

There would be nothing beautiful or awe inspiring about his death. It would not cause angels to pour down from heaven with tears falling gracefully from their eyes. No one would weep for him. There would be nothing beautiful about his death.

He forced those thoughts out of his mind, and instead, he focused his eyes on his reflection once more, on his hair that fell just beyond his jaw, on his eyes that had dimmed and had seemed to become hollow with time. The passing of time had not seemed to treat him well, he realized, looking at his reflection mixed with the bare branches that hung just beyond his window.

He found himself pondering his fate.

He lived his life carrying out the duties that his father left for him, by simply fulfilling what he was to do as his father's son. So of course, he couldn't help but wonder what his life could have been like had he lived for his own sake, had he established his own legacy. For that brief moment, he wanted that. He wanted something that was his. His and his alone.

A hand that was not his own rested on the window in front of him. He knew it at once, the long pale fingers, black fingernails. It was the man from his dreams. Though surely, that was impossible. Somehow, by some magnificent jest of the universe, the man was standing behind him.

Perhaps he was mad, perhaps the still cynical part of his mind was correct. Or perhaps the shadow was being kind, showing him the only thing he actually cared for in this world before it used that form to slaughter him.

Still, Ciel let himself relax, let his body sink back into the man. He allowed himself one moment, just this one, of comfort before he was doomed to die.

With this presence at his back, Ciel felt small. He felt young, naive, immature. He felt like he was once more a defenseless child waiting for something to rescue him.

Maybe he didn’t really want to die. Maybe he’d just convinced himself that he did in order to come to terms with the fate he’d been promised.

_I will claim you_ , he had been told. _Everything that you are will be mine._

And he still remembered the voice that had spoken those words deep into his consciousness. Deep, intelligent. Almost like the voice of the man from his dreams. But the man spoke differently. Ciel didn’t feel endangered by the man, and the sound of his voice didn’t freeze his core from terror. The man made him feel safe, cared for, protected. As if the man was a guardian, a companion, a shield that kept the darkness away. That kept the shadow away.

The man was warm, where the shadow felt like a catastrophic storm of ice and snow. The creature had promised to save him and to devour him, and the man…

The man had promised nothing to him, but had offered him companionship, had given him one more person that cared, that he felt like he could strip himself down to his core before and have the same courtesy extended to him. The man had offered him another ear, one that would believe anything he said.

He knew little about both, but for some reason, he had convinced himself that it was enough. He had simply decided that spending time with the man every now and then was enough. He had decided that being watched by the shadow had been enough.

What more did he want? It was a question that plagued his waking consciousness when he considered both, and now, with the man behind him and the shadow most likely waiting somewhere just beyond, now that he had reached his majority, what did he want?

He knew.

His eyes flashed with a life that had been missing from them for years because he knew.

Ciel Phantomhive wanted to live. He wanted to live, without being plagued by the thought of dying in the near future. He wanted to forge his own way in the world; he wanted to build his own empire. He wanted, with all of his being, all of his might, to become his own person, not ruled by the whims of some monster claiming to be his savior, or by the whims of a life long past.

With that thought, Ciel turned to face the man from his dreams. To take him in. To see for once with his own eyes, and not the ones he had in a dream, the man who had become one of his closest friends.

But to his dismay, there was nothing behind him, though he could still feel the heat radiating from that place behind him. That simple, lone fact inspired a similar thought to surface.

He hated the thought, he didn't want to entertain it, but perhaps. Perhaps.

Ciel, casting aside all of his past reservations, all of his old fears and thoughts, reached forward and found his hand resting against a breathing chest in the darkness.

He could feel it. Warmth and movement against his hand. And a steady thrum. One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four. Like the steps of a waltz. Fainter when the chest rose, more prevalent when it fell.

He could almost hear it in his head.

One, two, three, four. One, two, three, four.

Thump, thump, thump, thump. Thump, thump, thump, thump.

Like a steady drum or a metronome, a rhythm that was almost too perfect for anything real.

So that was it. He was crazy. The darkness couldn't have a pulse, a heartbeat. It couldn't be breathing, and it sure as hell couldn't be the man that spoke to him in dreams. He accepted that the shadow, with its unstable form and its almost demonic red eyes, could breath. He accepted that he sometimes heard the beating of its heart, but he expected it to be cold as death.

The man, on the other hand, had to have a pulse, had to breath, and he was warm, but Ciel could see him. Could see him in his entirety. Because he was real. He had to be. The shadow didn't have form and therefore couldn't touch him, but the man could. Had.

The man had, many times, comforted Ciel when he lamented his fate, back before he had succumbed to it. He had run a hand through Ciel’s hair, had held him close with a comforting arm.

A thought occurred to Ciel. Because he could touch it, the shadow, did that mean that the moment had come, minutes after midnight had struck, it was time for his fate to be sealed by the monster’s hands?

Though he had once been so resigned to that fate, he understood then, facing the shadow, as it stood, looming, something so terrifying, that he no longer accepted these terms. Everything that you are will be mine. It had been a promise, one that Ciel no longer wanted to keep. He no longer wanted to turn over his life to this being. He no longer-

He wasn’t afraid of it. He didn’t feel dread surging from it like poisonous waves. The shadow wasn’t cold, wasn’t freezing. It was warm. Like the man.

Ciel found his eyes tracing up the being, from where his hand lay on its chest to where he expected the face, the eyes to be. And there it was.

Two eyes. Red. Just as he remembered them. Just as he convinced himself they would be.

As he gazed into those eyes, the shadow began to take form. Less transparent, less like the shadows. Instead, it shifted. The flickering darkness solidified into the man that he would speak to.

_Everything you are will be mine._ Ciel no longer understood those words as he looked into that long familiar face. The man- the being- the creature- the shadow- Ciel wasn’t sure what he could call him. What would make sense. One time, in a dream, the man had told him that he wasn’t what Ciel had thought. He wasn’t a man at all. He had lived for centuries. Eons. The time he had spent on this earth, he had made it seem, by the lackadaisical way he spoke of it, was of no consequence. All that seemed to matter to the man, was the moment they were in. The man made it seem as though he had held each and every dream encounter in such high regard, as if he wished nothing more than to be with- to spend those valuable minutes and seconds and hours with- Ciel. It was something he could hardly understand.

Why him?

Of all the others that could have been saved that day, of all the others that could have been chosen, why was it that this… whatever he was, saved him? He wanted to ask. He had so many questions, that had built up over the years and had threatened to overflow within him. A quiet, yet shrill voice within him demanded he ask the questions.

Most of all, he wanted to know. Just what was he? What was this man, who was not a man? This shadow who could become flesh? This being? This creature? What was he and why did he claim that Ciel would be his?

In the darkness, blue eyes fell, along with his hand, as he realized the meaning of the phrase. Ciel had been for so long focused on the “everything” that he had never thought of it differently. Everything he was had been claimed. Ciel, the being had seemed to decide then, with no further explaining, would be his.

But, the young adult also understood, however, this being had not simply claimed him. He had spoken to Ciel; he had protected Ciel. He understood that everything that had been done, every action the being made, every decision, had a goal.

And the goal was to make Ciel his.

With a single breath to bring himself back to earth, Ciel looked back up into those red eyes.

What dedication. He couldn’t help but admire it- even if he didn’t quite know yet, how his feelings toward the man and the shadow had merged, and what kind of chimera they had created. What would it make? He wasn’t even quite sure how to define either perception.

One of the being’s hands rested on his cheek, radiating heat deep into Ciel’s core. The one that had laid on the window was brought to his waist. He hissed at the stabs of ice that crawled up his side. But the being didn’t seem to notice, instead Ciel’s attention was drawn away from the chilled hand to the ministrations to instead the being’s thumb, caressing his cheek.

When he found his attention refocused on the being, he found those red eyes fixed on his own, watching him carefully, as if trying to see deep into his being, into his soul.

Those eyes came closer, and closer until Ciel closed his eyes.

Though now he knew that it wouldn't be his death, he didn’t know what was to become of him. He didn’t know what to expect from the being before him, what it would mean to belong to such a being. Because wasn't that what the being wanted, to have all of Ciel? To own him in his entirety? To claim his everything?

Ciel got his answer, without a word having been uttered, when he felt the being's lips caress against his own. It was a surprise to him, in that he never expected this to come from the being. He never thought he'd receive such gentleness. Never from the creature. Though perhaps from the man? But since the two were one, what did that mean for Ciel?

The lips on his own were soft, but he could feel, with every slight movement the being made, so much being held back. What it was, he didn't know. There were so many- too many- things about this being that he didn't know. But he couldn't ignore the way he was pulled closer, the way the other tried so hard not to harm him.

Part of Ciel, the one that had single handedly decided that he was mad, cried out that he should get away. That it was a trick; that he should run.

The other, more amiable part whispered, almost drowned out by the first, that it would be best if he stayed.

So he focused on the pounding of the being's heart, the only proof Ciel had that the being was a living, breathing thing.

One, two. One, two.

The pace of the being's fluttering waltz had quickened, and Ciel could feel his own thrumming in tandem.

One, one, two, two.

He felt the burning of the hand on his face, the warming of the one on his side. Through those fingers, he could feel such a human pulse pushing against his skin. He could feel both of their heart rates quicken, as the hand on his face lowered to his jaw and raised his head, so the two were face to face, and Ciel could finally look into those deep red eyes. He could easily argue that over the years, though his memory had faded, that red he’d convinced himself he’d seen, had quickly and seamlessly become his favorite color.

The air was thick, Ciel couldn’t think of any other way to describe it than that. He couldn’t tell exactly what it was he felt, slipping in and out of his lungs, but he couldn’t draw his eyes from the pair before him. The words he thought weren’t what he wanted. He wanted something exact; he wanted the case as it was. But perhaps, he simply didn’t know the word to describe this feeling surrounding him.

_Enchanting, stifling…_ It was that feeling he’d read about but had never experienced. That word he’d read so many times but, when it would be the most useful, had forgotten.

As the larger being slowly came closer to him, the word whispered into his sub consciousness. As he allowed himself to be lifted from the floor, into the pair of strong arms that gladly embraced him, he knew that the word was correct. As he initiated the next kiss, as though he needed it to live, he knew that somewhere, somehow, it would have been like this no matter what. That this fate was written too long ago for him to fight against it.

As he was laid down and overtaken, he repeated that one word over and over in his thoughts.

_Aphrodisiacal._

* * *

He didn't open his eyes when he woke up. He didn't need to- to realize, from the light flowing into the room, how high in the sky the sun was. He felt sore, but at the same time, he felt as though the largest burden he'd ever had to bear was lifted from his shoulders. It occurred to him that it was still December fourteenth. He allowed himself to wake fully, to open his eyes and look at the room around him.

He was alone, though he certainly noticed the mussed bedding to his left, though it was cold- he noted as he reached over- as if its occupier hadn't been there for hours.

The clock in the hall began chiming. Ciel counted under his breath.  _One, two, three, four, five._

Slowly, carefully, and paying mind to the soreness under his skin, the young adult pushed himself from the bed, using anything in reach as support for his surprisingly weak legs. He paused, squeezing his eyes shut as blood rushed to his head. He wasn't surprised by it- after all, he most likely had been sleeping for over twelve hours.

What worried him most- struck deepest into his mind, sinking brutal fangs into his thoughts- was the fact that he could not remember the night before. He knew he probably should have been dead, should have been killed by the beast that saved his life.

A part of him was convinced that some new kind of vow, rather than protection, had been formed in the period of time he'd lost. He was convinced that he was safe. And maybe that was where all this relief came from- that he'd never have to worry about his untimely death again.

The door to the room opened with a creak, as if whoever stood on the other side had tried to go slowly, carefully- as to not startle or wake him. Ciel's attention was fixed on the door.

A man- the man, the one who had dwelled in his dreams- regarded him with a tray food in his hands.

It was strange to see him, of course. As the man had simply been a blurry face in his dreams. Ciel simply didn't expect him to be this handsome- and there was no way around that fact. The way his deep crimson eyes fell on Ciel, the way his long, lithe arms and fingers set the tray carefully on the night stand just beyond him.

When he walked, he glided. Each step taken with grace and purpose.

An old word drifted into Ciel's consciousness:  _enchanting._

It was as if every fluid movement from the man was an intricate spell weaved to ensnare Ciel- down to the very core of his being. The spell reached a crescendo as the man approached him, and Ciel found himself lifting his gaze, meeting the man's eyes.

A hand wrapped around his own, and as if prompted by that physical contact, Ciel's mind supplied the conclusion that he supposed he knew- deep down.

He was bound to that shadow from his past, who had taken the form of a man for him and him alone. This shadow, this creature-  _demon,_ his mind supplied- had vowed to claim him in his entirety, and their acts the night before had fulfilled that vow.

Ciel wasn't afraid of this creature, and he acknowledged fondly the swell in his chest as his gaze fell upon it.

It didn't matter to him that it was a demon; he was bound to it- to him. To this man he thought would only ever reside in his dreamworld.

Looking up at him now, Ciel felt compelled- to seal this, to bind the two of them further.

"I do," he rasped, his voice tender from both the strain he'd placed on it the night before and from the lack of use afterwards.

A vow from him to the demon.


End file.
